Have you ever come upon a book that looked so ridiculous that you had to read it? One of those books with a stupid name, an awful cover and where the photo of the author seemed to be a screenshot from a 70s porn movie? If not, you certainly haven’t spent enough time in libraries.

But if this has ever happened to you, you know full well that feeling of being called by the book, hearing that little voice in your head that says “oh come on, it’ll be fun”. And when you still hesitate to spend those precious two pounds on that nonsense you imagine the author’s photo on your bookshelf, next to Jane Austen, Agatha Christie and Isaac Asimov, and that’s it, you now need to buy it.

That’s more or less what happened to me the other day when “Conquered by Clippy” came up on my Twitter feed. While all my female friends were busy discussing how revolting the idea of a paperclip ever going near the most intimate parts of their anatomy was to them, I went straight to Amazon and was amazed by it. I’ve been a citizen of the internet since the late 90s and have seen my fair share of weird and disturbing porn, and not for a single second had I ever imagined someone could write a story about Clippy the paperclip. But it was real, it was there in front of me, and the cover was blowing my mind.